Begin here with music: note how the notation
Relies so intently on rightly-read clef.
If reader takes bass for the treble relation,
Then trouble’s pronounced and musician’s bereft.
Mentation frustration without keen attention:
I see in particular paradigm shift
That’s flung into vantage point, yielding dissension
When ref’rence frame crumbles with signposts adrift.
In chemistry classrooms, such unwanted hazards
Persist even further with vocab galore.
(HIO4, periōdic the acid;
While chart periǒdic is Table explored.)
Recall I a moment in own chem endeavor:
Confusing two units’ shared (seeming) veneer,
In reading wavenumber as “cm” whenever
The energy unit on paper appeared.
(A decade-plus passes before my chagrin
Fades at reaction clear in my own teacher’s face.
I understand now, but as novice, I didn’t;
Embarrassed I was, and my question, erased.)
Find “why” in a Feynman piece: read repercussions
Acknowledged if STEM’s talk is not standardized.
Hence we facilitate complex discussion,
With common notation that’s pinpoint-precise.
Mentioned in Music, a key introduction:
“By learning notation, we’ll open bookshelf.”
Learning Chem’s shibboleths: Why?
Lede is buried, I ruefully note to my Past Student Self.
As alluded to over the last few weeks, these July essays will be a more random collection from some ideas that have been percolating through a few years of teaching; clearly, they’ll vary in length, as well.
This poem addresses the challenging nuances of learning symbolic notation, especially as they pertain to chemistry; its consistent meter helped me arrange some scattered thoughts somewhat more coherently. Its themes are not novel. Many have written far more eloquently than I about the differences between experts and novices in a discipline; Saundra McGuire’s Teach Students How to Learn has been particularly illuminating, during my past few years in a chemistry faculty career. Rather, I am using this space to better organize my thoughts before the (ever-more-rapidly approaching) autumn term.
Begin here with music: note how the notation /
Relies so intently on rightly-read clef. /
If reader takes bass for the treble relation, /
Then trouble’s pronounced and musician’s bereft. /
Mentation frustration without keen attention: /
I see in particular paradigm shift /
That’s flung into vantage point, yielding dissension /
When ref’rence frame crumbles with signposts adrift.
Before I shift to my chemistry-focused discussion, I will start with a more familiar disciplinary convention: reading music.
Though I have never taken music theory coursework, I know from playing piano for several years that the bass and treble clefs of a piece of music are vital contextual information, as are the key and time signatures. In band classes and piano lessons, I spent much time learning how to read these important signifiers. If a musician is given a piece of music written in the bass clef, but accidentally interprets it as being in the treble clef, dissonance ensues! They would be performing the wrong notes in the wrong octave: musically bereft.
I’ve had a few such experiences in my life when practicing piano; upon realizing it, my “reference frame crumbled” until the “signposts” of that notation re-resolved themselves in my mind. (I borrowed Thomas Kuhn’s phrasing of “paradigm shift” to illustrate the idea of reframing the experienced world, admittedly on a tiny scale.)
I’ve also seen this “mentation frustration” in chemistry.
In chemistry classrooms, such unwanted hazards /
Persist even further with vocab galore. /
(HIO4, periōdic the acid; /
While chart periǒdic is Table explored.)
With its complex vocabularies, chemistry has all sorts of inherent stumbling blocks, where similar wordings can mean very different things. Interpretation requires an awareness of context, analogous to knowing the staffs in musical notation.
The example I cite here is well-known. The molecular formula HIO4 corresponds to a molecule called “periōdic acid,” where the word “periodic” is pronounced with a long O (as in “boat”). The word “periǒdic” as it pertains to the “Periodic Table of the Elements,” by contrast, is pronounced with a short O (as in “fox”).
In the first example, “periodic” is a name communicating information about the atoms in the molecule; in the second example, “periodic” describes how elements’ properties recur as organized in their famous table. These two terms are spelled identically but pronounced differently; they differ completely in their meaning. None of this is immediately obvious to a new student.
Recall I a moment in own chem endeavor: /
Confusing two units’ shared (seeming) veneer, /
In reading wavenumber as “cm” whenever /
The energy unit on paper appeared. /
(A decade-plus passes before my chagrin fades /
At reaction clear in my own teacher’s face. /
I understand now, but as novice, I didn’t; /
Embarrassed I was, and my question, erased.)
These lines recount my own experience with a similar challenge. Centimeters and wavenumbers are both units used in chemistry. Centimeters are abbreviated as “cm,” while wavenumbers are “inverse centimeters,” abbreviated as “cm-1.” The units look similar [they have a “shared (seeming) veneer”], but they measure different quantities; centimeters are units of length, while wavenumbers are units of energy, most directly useful for chemists in expressing spectroscopic information. The abbreviations have different meanings.
I remember vividly a question I once had as an undergraduate student, in my own “chem endeavor.” This question concerned an infrared spectrum, in which the pertinent data are presented in wavenumbers. In talking to the course professor, I started to ask my question, incorrectly expressing the unit as centimeters (the poem’s meter here requires the unit to be read as the separate letters: “c”;“m”). My professor blanched and emphatically corrected me: “WAVENUMBERS.” I was embarrassed and promptly forgot whatever question I’d actually had.
Years later, I understand the vehemence of my professor’s reaction. To a trained chemist, my question was the gauche equivalent of “referr[ing] to George Eliot as a ‘he’ in a room full of English professors,” to take this into yet another discipline and quote The Well of Lost Plots, from Jasper Fforde’s inventive Thursday Next series. But as a student, I was surprised and chagrined; my takeaway was that I had insulted a professor I respected, by phrasing my question incorrectly.
Find “why” in a Feynman piece: note repercussions /
Acknowledged if STEM’s talk is not standardized. /
Hence we facilitate complex discussion, /
With common notation that’s pinpoint-precise.
Something that I never found directly acknowledged (as a student) was “why” I was spending so much time on a doubly difficult subject: the obvious concepts were challenging enough; why was there also an important symbolic layer that was comparatively de-emphasized in class? Eventually, I saw the symbols enough that they became second-nature, and again, I forgot the question.
Years later, I would find a Richard Feynman essay that directly addressed these concerns. Feynman discusses creating his own set of symbols as a student, with which he describes his findings in his home lab. He notes a classmate’s confusion at these non-standard representations, though, and recounts, “I thought my symbols were just as good, if not better, than the regular symbols– it doesn’t make any difference what symbols you use– but I discovered later that it does make a difference…. I realized that if I’m going to talk to anybody else, I’ll have to use the standard symbols.” Even later, I would hear Hope Jahren speak eloquently of the tension between disciplinary and everyday language in an interview regarding her outstanding memoir Lab Girl and her deliberate choice to avoid jargon in writing it: “[Scientific terms] are part of a language that takes years to learn and that scientists speak amongst themselves. So by describing these things in terms that you use every day, I’ve made the choice to come to you using your words in order that you understand me. And that’s breaking a rule.” (In both quotes, the emphasis is mine.)
As a student, I was keenly interested in both English and chemistry. I was aware that language was functioning differently in my science classes than in my writing coursework; I was frustrated that I couldn’t fully understand or articulate that difference. Both Feynman’s and Jahren’s candid comments would have been immensely useful.
Mentioned in Music, a key introduction: /
“By learning notation, we’ll open bookshelf.” /
Learning Chem’s shibboleths: Why? /
Lede is buried, I ruefully note to my Past Student Self.
Learning music begins with direct acknowledgements of the notation: why did I want to learn it, as a student? So I could “open [the] bookshelf,” find a songbook, and play music on the piano. Teachers consistently explained this; music was accessible and fun; the motivation was clear.
The “Why?” behind learning chemistry’s symbolic language is comparatively hidden, even though it’s similar. To collaborate with other scientists, one needs to be able to speak with them, using their “pinpoint-precise” notations for challenging concepts. That unacknowledged language-learning is a big part of General Chemistry. The textbooks are filled with unintentional shibboleths: generally defined in the margins and sidebars but rarely recognized as equivalent in importance to “getting the right answer” to algorithmic questions and calculations on exams.
My last line acknowledges that this crucial information, the lede, is buried. It also highlights my current “rueful” distance from my student experience: how nearly completely I’d forgotten that sense of frustration. I will work to remember and empathize, as I approach the new academic year.
Chemphasis 
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